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Mehrzeller: polygon camping

Most innovations in travel trailer design are actually reflections on the past, such as the Airstream and the Shasta Airflyte. We can’t remember the last time we saw a genuine leap forward, so our hearts leapt when we spotted the Mehrzeller caravan concept.

Mehrzeller means “multi cell” and it’s building a buzz at the giant Caravan Salon Düsseldorf, Europe’s biggest RV show. This particular travel trailer is the creation of Christian Freissling and Theresa Kalteis, two designers from Graz University of Technology in Austria, and they’ve got backing from some of the biggest names in European industry.

One of Mehrzeller’s sponsors is BMW, itself no stranger to design controversy. (‘Flame surfacing’, anyone?) It’s good to see the Bayern boys sponsoring this project, and the X6 towing the Mehrzeller in the artist’s impressions looks a damn sight tastier than a lumbering Ford Explorer.

Unfortunately, Squob does not sprechen Sie Deutsches, so we’ll have to rely upon the Caravan Salon blurb for more details: ‘Every customer configures his own very personal caravan according to his or her wishes and needs, with the help of an online configurator. Thus each vehicle is absolutely unique. The honeycomb exterior design is continued in the interior: Each function has its own cell.’

From what we can gather, the configurator would allow you to personalise your own travel trailer within preset parameters, and send your design straight to manufacturing. Which is all well and good, but what if you finished off a bottle of Jägermeister during a spot of late-night Konfigurating, and then hit SEND?

Goodness knows what the drag co-efficient is, and you probably couldn’t take the Mehrzeller through a car wash. But let’s not quibble. Even the interior looks cool, oozing an Ikea-style bleached-wood-and-white-paint minimalism. There’s no other word for it: The Mehrzeller is simply fantastisch!

I live full time in a 1972 Airstream trailer and love it. It is nice to see a modern view, but I would have a real hard time living with all the angles, too harsh. I prefer the roundness of the lines in the Airstream which gives a nice cocoon feeling.

I also would worry about leaks and sturdiness in between cells additions. What the shelf life of such units?

Any way my 2 cents ;-) Still, its very cool to see people working an alternatives smaller housing. I live very well in my Airstream and I never thought I would.